University of Illinois Selects AirTap as Their Water Heating Technology for Solar Decathlon
The University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign) has chosen AirTap™ over other water heating technologies in designing an energy-efficient house for the fourth Solar Decathlon, an educational program undertaken by the Department of Energy to promote and encourage energy efficiency in building and operating houses.
Houston, Texas (PRWEB) February 3, 2009 -- The University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign) has chosen AirTap™ over other water heating technologies in designing an energy-efficient house for the Department of Energy's fourth Solar Decathlon, which will be held on the National Mall in Washington, DC, in the fall of 2009.
The Solar Decathlon is an educational program undertaken by the Department of Energy to promote and encourage energy efficiency in building and operating houses. The competition features twenty US and international university-led teams. This year's teams have been selected from universities in the United States, Canada, and Germany and each team has received $100,000 from DOE to uniquely design, build and operate an energy efficient, fully solar-powered home for this unique competition.
The Decathlon gets its name from the 10 specific areas of competition: architecture, engineering, market viability, communications, comfort, appliances, hot water, lighting, energy balance, and transportation. The 'hot water' segment of the contest requires teams to simulate average household hot-water consumption and deliver 15 gallons of water at 110°F in 10 minutes or less.
"We were planning on using a solar thermal - heat pump hybrid but after evaluating the cost and performance of solar thermal with an AirTap™, we decided to deploy the AirTap™ strictly by itself", said Alan Mellovitz, Solar Decathlon team member from University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign).
Sunil Sinha, Chief Scientist at Air Generate, commented "We are pleased that UIUC has selected the most energy-efficient technology for heating water. It will be a great showcase for AirTap™ running on solar power and is in line with our company's future vision of zero-energy water heater".
For additional information on AirTap™, please go to www.airgenerate.com.
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